Italian grocery start-up Cortilia raises €1.5m from P101

Milan, Italy-based P101 is the latest company to invest in Cortilia, providing the Italian online local grocery marketplace with €1.5m.

Bringing its total funding to €2.5m since its 2011 founding, Cortilia is now halfway to its ultimate goal of €5m.

P101’s investment allows the company to expand its market presence in Italy, invest in R&D, hire new talent, extend its product range and improve its service standards.

With annual revenues of more than €2m, Cortilia – already well established in Lombardy – is planning to further develop its web platform to seize opportunities linked to food e-commerce and mobile commerce, which are rapidly growing in Italy.

Cortilia is an online agricultural marketplace that allows consumers a subscription service, which sees deliveries of fresh produce to users’ doors at the click of a button.

Soon to launch its service in some of Italy’s other northern cities, Cortilia CEO Marco Porcaro is confident of further expansion.

“Thanks to our customers who trust us, to farmers who enthusiastically join Cortilia, and a young and talented team, we will continue to expand the range of services and products offered,” said Porcaro.

“With these new resources and with the support of P101, we want to expand our team and improve the platform and logistic service, covering new geographical areas.

“In the coming months we will involve at least 50 new farmers that will find in Cortilia a partner capable of enhancing their productive excellence. Our results demonstrate that, as Expo 2015 will confirm in the next few months, you can innovate by creating new models of distribution of food.”